Scranton School Board members are shaking their heads on cue, expressing dismay over the situation and promising to get to the bottom of it all. While that’s nice, perhaps this issue might have come up sooner if the board wasn’t preoccupied with squabbling over ethics rules, leadership and the inalienable right of certain longtime Democratic hacks to hire their relatives and neighbors to district jobs.

The Scranton teachers’ union also chimed in, demanding the shortage be addressed … by September. Sorry, current students. All this begs the question: Why wasn’t the union raising a stink earlier in the school year?